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1 Year After Cobain

Kurt Lives On, In Nirvana's Music And Among His Fans

April 04, 1995|By Devin Rose. Tribune Staff Writer.

More Nirvana ahead: You fans have probably cranked your Nirvana CDs a zillion times. So keep an ear out - a live Nirvana album is in the works, though Geffen Records isn't giving a release date yet. Also, if you liked Michael Azerrad's book "Come As You Are: The Story of Nirvana," you might want to check out the latest version: He's added a final chapter since Kurt's death.

Nirvana's Kurt Cobain has been gone a year, almost to the day. Fans of the singer/songwriter sometimes feel as if he's been gone a million years - yet we can remember those awful, heart-sinking moments when we found out he shot himself as if it were yesterday. And over the past year, Nirvana certainly didn't fade away: The band lived on in fans' hearts and on the charts. Here's a look at the year since Kurt's death.

-That unforgettable day. On April 8, 1994, the story at first emerged slowly and eerily: Something terrible had happened at Kurt's Seattle home. The news came into the Tribune in stops and starts: An electrician had discovered a body in the house - it was the body of a white man in his 20s - and finally, what we already knew inside: The body was Kurt's, and he had shot himself. By evening, the news was all over the radio and TV. Fans watched MTV updates in a daze.

Police found a suicide note; Courtney Love, Kurt's widow, read parts of it on tape for a vigil in his honor. And medical examiners determined that Kurt, 27, had died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound three days before he was found.

Everyone from fans to parents to music execs debated Kurt's final act. You could find their words on-line and in magazine letters to the editor; you could hear heated conversations in record stores and fast-food joints. What a loser, some said. What a troubled man, others said more sympathetically. Some asked, where were his friends and family? Others answered, they couldn't have helped him. Some adults worried that kids would imitate their idol and there would be a rash of copy cat suicides (one was reported). But in the middle of all the fear, kids seemed to get the reality: Kurt was a talented but shy and depressed guy who was tortured by a chronic stomach ailment and distressed by his leap to fame - and he was someone who lost a battle against heroin addiction. What he did was far from heroic - but many kids understood how much he hurt.

Nirvana fan Greg A., 15, of Palos Park, says Kurt's pain was clear. "In the last line of his suicide note, he says something like, 'I was too much of an erratic, moody person, I don't have the passion anymore.' He lost the passion because he gave it to us."

And Greg's passion for Nirvana hasn't faded. "I'm as big a fan as I've ever been. My walls are lined with posters."

The main thing Greg remembers about Kurt is this: "He expressed the pain and all the sorrow and bad things that have happened in this generation. Stuff like crime, guns, AIDS... it's all bearing down hard on our shoulders. Kurt provided a lot of us with a break. He spoke for all our anger."

-"Unplugged," tuned in. In the hours after Kurt's death was reported, MTV showed Nirvana's November '93 "Unplugged" performance over and over. Many fans stayed glued to the tube as Kurt, looking like a grampa in his gnarly sweater, sang intensely but sweetly. When the "Unplugged" album came out months later, fans snapped it up. Singles from the album, like "Man Who Sold the World" and "About a Girl," are still getting decent play on the radio.

Last September, Nirvana won the MTV Best Alternative Video award for "Heart-Shaped Box." Bass player Krist Novoselic and drummer Dave Grohl accepted the award. Dave noted that if it seemed like something was missing, it was: their leader and good friend Kurt.

-Friends till the end. Dave and Krist were horrified by Kurt's death - but not surprised. They knew all about his depression and suicide threats. In fact, weeks earlier, Kurt had overdosed in Rome; many people believed it was a suicide attempt. After his death, Dave and Krist pulled away from the world so they could heal. Now they're moving on. Dave is in a new band called Foo Fighters (you can check them out May 6 at the Metro). Krist is starting in a new band, too (details were sketchy as we put this story together).

-Love lives through it. Courtney has gotten a lot of grief in the past few years. She's loud and opinionated, and some people said she was nothing but trouble for Kurt. (Others said it was her love that kept Kurt going as long as he did.) Her critics accused her of riding Kurt's wave of stardom and said her own music wasn't that great.

Courtney was in a no-win situation just after Kurt's death. Her band, Hole, which music insiders predicted was on the verge of becoming huge, was just releasing its album "Live Through This." Courtney put the album tour on hold and went into seclusion. The album did turn out to be a smash.

And Courtney has changed some minds. She still gets in trouble - she and Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails feuded, she got nailed for being rowdy on an airplane, and a fan accused her of punching him. But it was impressive that she managed to keep going, and take care of daughter Frances, at such a rough time. Also, Rolling Stone readers named her Best Female Singer of '94; in the 'zine's critics picks, she was named Artist of the Year (readers picked Nirvana). And she was awesome in her December "Saturday Night Live" performance.